Channel 2’s tasteless report on Pistons’ emergency landing

We’re only a few days into the new year, but we have a clear leader for the most tasteless sports report on local television.

Monday night on KPRC (Channel 2), reporter Joel Eisenbaum had a story on the Pistons’ team plane making an emergency landing at Hobby Airport after a warning light indicated potential hydraulic problems.

Eisenbaum — and you can see the whole ridiculous charade on Channel 2’s website — asked a guy playing basketball in the park across from Toyota Center, “Are you glad to hear that everybody’s all right, or are you thinking, hey, maybe this will rattle their game a little bit?”

I’m going to give Eisenbaum the benefit of the doubt and presume that his assignments editor requested him to ask such a stupid, moronic, tasteless question.

I would prefer to think it’s not something that a professional would do without coercion.

I was amused to note that the question was framed with his back to the camera.

I don’t think I could have looked into a camera and asked anybody that question, either, even if I were told to do so.

76 Responses

Come now Dave. Don’t tell me you actually expected an intelligent question from a KPRC reporter. Those kinds of questions only get asked by accident.

Eisenbaum is hardly the first of his species to do this. TV reporters are infamous for covering a house fire and asking the homeowner how he feels about watching his house burn down.

I remember an especially horrifying example of this kind of stupid insensitivity some years back, when a small child drowned in White Oak Bayou. As divers pulled the child’s body out of the water, with his mother watching and hysterical, one of the TV reporters shoved a microphone in her face asking “How does this make you feel?”

Nothing a local TV reporter says or does surprises me. Some years back the late great Chicago columnist Mike Royko declared that as a species, with only a few rare exceptions, local TV reporters are the most vacant and stupid people on the face of the Earth.

I don’t know if Reyna operates with impunity, but based on her on-air performance, she can’t pronounce or deliver those words but will smile like a dolt and be thankful she got an anchor chair despite having no talent.

I didn’t say I was surprised. The oldest item on my DVR is a former Channel 2 reporter doing a story on a person who was shot while going out for a hamburger and some fries and reporting the story while holding in her hands — you guessed it — a hamburger and some fries. Appalled, yes. Surprised, no.

David, when I lived in Philadelphia, I noticed a definite difference in the reporting on KYW, the NBC affiliate at that time. (They’ve since switched affiliations with WCAU, the former CBS affiliate.) KYW always seemed to sensationalize a story more than others. In the more than dozen years I’ve been here in Houston, I’ve noticed the same from KPRC. I wonder if this kind of thing comes from the network itself.

Well, i’ll give you Channel 2 has the most annoying and embarrassing field reporters on local TV – Ryan Korsgard tops that list for sure. But having said that, I’m not sure this is really that big of a deal. He interviewed a fan of the Rockets…

It would’ve been much different if the plane had crashed and all survived with an overnight stay in the hospital or something like that. And it would’ve been different if he would’ve asked the fan if he would have preferred the plane crash to get a free game out of it. That would’ve been tasteless and Joel would probably be out of a job right now.

But its a fair question of a fan if he/she thinks the Pistons will be rattled a bit from this. I’m sure the Piston fans are wondering the same thing. So, I’m not sure what the big deal is here… this is classic mountain out of a mole hill opinion… sounds like it was a slow news day for Joel and a slow one for you as well Dave.

Dave we don’t watch KPRC for their journalistic skills and ‘cutting’ edge stories! We watch them for the ‘beautiful people’ that they are (Joel Eisenbaum excluded). I can’t watch most of the Aiken’s Army stuff because it’s complete trash. However, again I love their anchors because at the end of the day most of the ‘news’ information is almost the same. I just need a beautiful face to tell me all the bad stuff going on in the world. It seems to taste a little better.

that is channel 2 for u, tabloid reporters at their best. That is why we donts watch them anymore. Remember when this dude did the wheel of justice on the news? HE would roll up his sleeves of his shirt like he was a working man. What a tool.

The question doesn’t even make sense:
“Are you glad to hear that everybody’s all right, or are you thinking, hey, maybe this will rattle their game a little bit?”
Those aren’t remotely mutually exclusive events. If they hadn’t been able to land safely, i.e. not “everyone’s all right”, I think that would qualify as much more than “rattling their game”. Really pathetic journalism.

Ban me if you want to david. What are you retarded or something? this was a good professional report with a little light humor. And anyone at the chron has no business calling anyone else out! this has to be the dummest story that i have ever read; in my entire life; on the chron

KPRC is an embarrassment. Period. From their “local yocal” moniker and the apparent insistence on hiring reporters/anchors with dialects that sound either “hick Texan” or worse, they pander to the worst in this community. I wish someone would buy them and clean house!

does anyone even care about the rockets this season? the managment did not do anything productive during the offseason. they did not get anyone who can help their team. except for maybe mchale.
such a sad team

I don’t get it. If KPRC is so “terrible” and is as bad as everyone (not EVERYONE) says on here, why continue to watch? And really, does anyone reading this actually care if the Piston’s plane was alright? So what’s the point of this article? Slow news day as always? Needed another reason to point out an imperfection in someone that’s not the Chronicle? I’ll bet if someone reported seeing poop on the sidewalks in downtown everyday from the homeless, the Chronicle would try to do a story and make some light jokes out of it, rather than the fact that there are people living in downtown with nowhere to go and eating out of trashcans to live. But I digress. I don’t really care

I am reminded of a stunt they pulled a couple of years ago where they found some random dog and spent weeks hyping that they thought they had found “Radar’s long lost sister” – the “news event” culminated in DNA testing that confirmed that – no, the dog was no relation to Radar. Hard-hitting journalism there, Dominique.

Dave, why are you liberals such pricks. Are you mad because Joel is a fairly handsome reporter, and probably got allot of snatch. Don’t be bitter, because girls were probably repulsed by you. Don’t be bitter, because you probably spent most of your youth, polishing rocks, or helping your mother sew? Dave, don’t be bitter that you did not have a father figure in the house, I’m assuming, and as a result-hate white heterosexual males.

Dave, if you think Obama and his Democratic/Communist party are doing a good job-I’ve got a bridge to sell you.

Dave, get your panties out of a wad, and grow up. The plane is fine. It was a false signal. Joel asked this guy, if he thought the scare might effect their performance. WTF is wrong with that ?

Dave, did you know Sharia Law, which Obama wants for our country, demands that gays are hung? Just askin’ !

So called journalists like yourself, are the reason the chronicle has tanked. Liberalism is a mental disorder !

It’s amazing any writer for the Chronicle can critize anybody for poor journalism or reporting. They wrote the book on it. If that was a plane full of Tea Party people, it would have been interesting to see how it was reported in the Chronicle.

Jenn is mini Sachse, following the same path of implants and traffic and flirting as the looks whither away. Only difference is Sachse studied journalism and I think Reyna earned stripe as a Rockwear swimsuit model and never learned the reading thing.

Hey David answer me another question, why does the Chron.com edit a story and remove the comments when it involves minorities, I don’t think anyone from the comical should comment on other news outlets in the city—take care of your own nonsense first.

Well Rusty, I would guess it’s probably because 95% of the commenters can’t make their point without being racist and hateful. There’s plenty of ways to get a point across without adding those two things to the mix. Unless you’re just those two things to begin with.

Well, I certainly wish the pay scale for newspaper reporters approached that of TV anchors. But, more to the point of this particular entry, I assure you that I can be just as inane as any TV reporter. I just try to avoid doing so whenever possible.

That’s nothing. I remember when Don Wilson (great Astros pitcher for the uninformed)committed suicide back in the 70’s. A local TV reporter (who shall go nameless as he still works in Houston)asked Astos GM Spec Richardson how he thought the pitching rotation would be impacted by Wilson’s death. While they were standing outside Wilson’s house! The look of disbelief on Spec’s face was classic. He had to remind the reporter that Wilson’s family came first. What a knucklehead.

Oh come on already. Everybody is just waiting for anything to jump on whenever someone speaks! Yeah maybe this reporter made that comment cause he seen one of the Pistons Tebowing! Or maybe it was cause they were black! – I doubt this reporter purposely made light of what happened. I doubt that plane was ever in any real danger of crashing! Get a life already!

I read this piece expecting to read something dreadful that had been said on the air. Instead….not much of anything. Eisenbaum’s comment wasn’t NEARLY as bad as you made it out to be. I’m very disappointed. I also suggest you lighten up. And for the record, I hate Channel 2. I wanted to be able to look down on them more than I already do but you didn’t give me a good reason to.

Making comments about on Chron.com about tasteless, low-quality “reporting” is ironically funny. That said, Ch 2 is the worst station in town for TV news now. Any station that would hire Dominque Sache and immediately make her a news anchor is definitely not concerned with journalism. Poor Ron Stone is spinning in his grave. Have not watched Ch2 news in years.

Happiness is opening the Monday morning com. paper and stumble across this Taste of Texas snack and just couldn’t resist reading the litany of bash and trash. Once upon a time Houston delivered to the world two of journalism’s finest -Walter Cronkite and Dan Rather. Nowadays, we have sunken to a morbid low in our need to know about all the bad what’s going on in the world – the worse the better -and have a purdy face to tell ya’ about it on your 60′ HDTV screen. Remember Lisa Faronda – Channel 11? One radio show announced that she’d said that she’d rather have hot pokers through her eyes than do local news ever again. Jennifer Bauer cracks me up with her chihuahua-style reporting. I have always enjoyed seeing that ageless, good ol’ boy beauty, Bob Allen, flash that million $$ smile and tell me about the play-by-play’s and not understand a thang about sports. And have taken great delight in listening to Jose Grinon’s voice and not hear a word he is saying. I still miss Marvin’s thunderous voice as he announced his Slime in the Ice Machine report. Well, friends and neighbors, that’s the televised news industry…it, like your posts, is ENTERTAINMENT.